


The Time of the Ancient Mariner

by OurPaleCompanion



Category: Doctor Who, The Silmarillion
Genre: Crossover, Elves, Fantasy, First Age, Gen, Science Fiction
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-08
Updated: 2015-12-19
Packaged: 2018-05-05 17:45:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 19,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5384678
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OurPaleCompanion/pseuds/OurPaleCompanion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>With the fall of Gondolin, Elvish power in Beleriand is almost extinct. Morgoth controls the North, and it's only a matter of time until the Mouths of Sirion are decimated by his hordes. But into this hopeless situation falls a madman in a box...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**The Time of the Ancient Mariner**

**Prologue**

 

"You won't make it," Clara said.

"A fortnight? Please," the Doctor scoffed, wedging the handset under his cheek as he patted his pockets down. "A sneeze to a Time Lord. I've lost fortnights on accident before – decades, in fact. And, on at least one occasion, a yesterday," he said, pulling his sonic screwdriver from his pocket and running it along the TARDIS console.

"No," Clara retorted, "No, this is you, so I guarantee that the moment I hang up some kind of…spacey-wacey hyper-crisis is going to fall into your lap and I'll be getting frantic calls between piña coladas."

"Hyper-crisis," the Doctor muttered dismissively. "You do have an imagination, you know; 99% of the time, the universe just gets on with getting on, to listen to you you'd think it was an action movie."

"Then how comes," Clara asked, "it always seems to be so when I'm with you?"

"You only see the highlights," the Doctor mumbled in response as he flicked impatiently between sonic settings. "The greatest hits. You're good to have around in a pinch - you seem to have a way of inspiring good ideas; you're the brick wall for the echo."

"Brick wall," Clara deadpanned. "Charming. I suppose it's better than-"

"I  _told_ you," the Doctor interjected, lowering his voice, "I didn't realise that's what it meant."

"Neither did the Mayoress," Clara replied. "The children were more than happy to  _explain_ it to her, though. In detail."

"Well, I think that's more than enough goodbyeing," The Doctor announced loudly before Clara could finish speaking. "I don't want to keep you and P.E. waiting."

"Maths teacher," Clara repeatedly, boredly, for the ninth time that month.

"Why a P.E. teacher would be interested in roads in the first place, I've no idea," the Doctor continued unheeding, wrapping the handset's cord around his chest as he turned this way and that, tending to the TARDIS' circuits. "Far too linear and that. Not violent enough, either, they just…go," he mumbled, almost to himself.

Clara paused. "No,  _Rhodes!_ " she replied. "The island, in Greece!"

"Oh!" the Doctor replied, spinning to free himself from the tangled cord. "Did I ever tell you of the time I ran into an Auton there? Massive, he was – no idea how – but he'd managed to pass himself off as a-"

A bustle of voices and activity down the line cut the Doctor short, before Clara came back. "Taxi's here," she said in the secretive voice she used when Danny was around. "See you soon."

"Enjoy your boring planet," the Doctor replied.

"Two days," Clara whispered. "I'm calling it. You'll last two days, spaceman."

"A lot can happen in two days!" The Doctor called down the phone, frowning as the line suddenly went dead. "I asked her," he said to the phone, "I said,  _why holiday on your own planet when you can see the crystal waterfalls of Ferula?_  But no, apparently P.E. 'wouldn't like that'! Humans," he sighed as he stretched to replace the handset.

Without warning, the TARDIS lurched violently and sent him sprawling across the console, digging his heels into the grille to keep him from falling any further. Alarms and sirens blared, and the soft lighting became harsh and red.

"What? What is it now?" he called out as he righted himself, swinging a screen towards him as he wrapped his other arm around a rail. His bushy eyebrows rose dramatically as he saw his place in time tearing backwards at an alarming rate. "Eh? What do you think  _you're_ playing at?" he asked the screen angrily, flicking and poking it like a tired beast of burden. The numbers, however, told no lie; they were tumbling down the vortex, screaming into the primordial past.

"No, no, no!" the Doctor cried out as he furiously jabbed at buttons, trying to get the TARDIS back under control. "I've told you, you can't be flying off on your own like this, it's very bad for my trust issues!" The numbers on the screen flew further and further backwards, while the Doctor ran unsteadily around the console, pulling out every stop he could find. "Ah, Daleks," he muttered, giving up on trying to arrest the TARDIS' flight and instead crawling beneath the console and bracing himself for the inevitable.

Touchdown, however, was surprisingly gentle, and the Doctor – after a quick check to make sure he had the right number of fingers – slid out of his hiding place, dusting himself down. "Are you quite finished?" he said grumpily.

Despite his sarcasm, the silence unnerved him deeply. The usual "resting" thrum of the TARDIS was gone, leaving behind an eerie stillness broken only by the clunk and thunk of the cooling systems.

"Oh, come on," the Doctor chastised his vessel, pumping a lever energetically, "you can't be that tired! You've only gone-" he choked as he swung the screen towards him. "-seven billion years?!" He blurted, whizzing the sonic across the screen. The numbers remained unchanged. His face set like plaster, hard and serious. "That's the when," he said to himself, pressing buttons, "but  _where_  are we?"

NO RECORD, the screen flashed.

"Oh, now you're just being unfair!" The Doctor cried out to the heavens. He eyed the door suspiciously; with no sensors online, there was no way to know if the outside world was dangerous or not.

"Seven billion years ago," he muttered as he inched closer to the door. "Early phase of life in the universe. Lots of habitable worlds,  _young_  worlds, full of energy and oxygen, and…leeches the size of mountains," he trailed off. He glanced back to the TARDIS console, its central dome rising and falling gently, like the breathing of a sleeper. It steeled his resolve. "If you've brought me somewhere you can't get back from," he addressed his ship, straightening his cuffs, "you must have had a good reason." He walked to the door and gripped the handle, breathing deeply before pushing it open to stride out into a wall of arrows.

A dozen tall, slender figures in golden helmets and finely-pattered armour which had once been gold, but now was battered and tarnished with blood, mud and filth, stood in a semi-circle around the door with tall bows nocked and aimed at him. Their eyes, bright and starry, stared through him as though he was already dead – or, possibly, they were.

"Oh…hello," he said. One, sharp-faced and unarmed, stepped forward and addressed him. Definitely an officer, the Doctor thought.

" _Man esselya ná?"_ He said. The Doctor's eye twitched in surprise.

"I…what?" he spluttered. "What language is that?"

" _Man cárat_?" The tall, angry-looking officer asked, more forcefully than before. The sound of tightening bowstrings was deafening over the silence. The Doctor's brows furrowed before he broke into a wide smile.

"'Scuse me," he whispered before turning back into the TARDIS. "Oi!" He called out. "Sort it out!" He turned back to find the bowmen regarding him with suspicious and intimidated looks. "Sorry about that," he said, leaning casually on the lintel. "Translation circuits must be offline. Happens, sometimes, after a big journey – they'll be back any second now."

" _Man cárnet?_ " the officer asked, his brow knotted in confusion, pointing back into the TARDIS.

"Oh, that?" The Doctor replied, pointing back himself. The officer nodded. "That's the TARDIS. It's my ship. It brought me here, though I don't know how…she does that," he trailed off as he saw his adversary's face darkening with impatience.

" _Man_ name  _ná?_ "

The Doctor's eyebrows rose. "Oh…oh, now we're getting somewhere!" The gentleman's stern expression melted into surprise as he heard a word he recognised. "Yes! Yes, you understand me now, don't you? Oh, you beauty!" He called back into the TARDIS as the bowmen looked between each other, unnerved.

" _Man e_ s going on?" one of them muttered to another. " _Má_  did he start talking  _Eldarin?_ "

" _Eldarin_ , eh?" The Doctor said, walking slowly towards the officer with the points of the arrows following his movement perfectly. "Can't say I've heard of that. But that's good, that's good; I do love a challenge," he said, his eyes drifting to where the officer's hand rested tightly on the hilt of his sword. "Who are you?"

The officer's face was still yet seething. The Doctor's gaze was held tight by bright blue eyes that seemed almost as old as his own. "I am Galdor of Gondolin," he said, his grip on his sword loosening imperceptibly. "And you?"

"Me?" The Doctor replied. "I'm the Doctor."


	2. Chapter 2

"Doctor?" Galdor repeated, exaggerating the consonants in his mouth. The Doctor raised his eyebrows in acknowledgement. Some quirk of the TARDIS' translation circuits ensured its pilots name defied translation and remained a universal constant. "Not a name I know in the tongues of Eldar, Sindar, or Edain."

"I doubt you would," the Doctor grinned. "It's a world all its own."

"How, then, can I be sure you're not an agent of Morgoth?" Galdor challenged him, stepping forward to go almost nose-to-nose with the strange old man.

"Never heard of him," the Doctor retorted. "Does that help?" The bowmen laughed mirthlessly and the Doctor cast a wary eye across their faces. They all had the same hungry, defeated, dangerous look in their eyes.

"As lies go," Galdor said with a tired smile, "that's one of the more creative I've heard." The horseshoe of archers tightened around the Doctor, each bowman taking a step forward in unison. The barbs of their arrows glistened in the weak winter sunlight, filtered down through the canopies of tall pine trees.

"D'you treat all your visitors like this, I wonder?" The Doctor grumbled, his brow knotted in frustration.

"Only those who lie to me," Galdor replied, his voice becoming hard and stern. "Give me your name, or my archers will open fire!"

"I just have!" The Doctor shouted back, gesticulating furiously. "Saints preserve us, why did you drop me in amongst these…loonies?" he shouted at the TARDIS, smacking the door.

"What are you, then?" Galdor demanded. "You're no Elf – not even one of the Moriquendi would look so…haggard," he spat, eliciting a look of danger from his captive. "You seem a Man, yet you appear and disappear into this… _thing_ ," he said, regarding the TARDIS suspiciously. "So I ask again – what are you? Some new form of Balrog sent by Morgoth to destroy Arvernien by stealth and false friendship? Because know that I will order you killed to preserve what is left of this world!"

The creak and strain of bowstrings filled the air, punctuated only by the cries of birds and rustle of leaves on the wind. The Doctor sighed. "I'm not from this world," he said. "I came from…out there," he explained, pointing upward. "I go places, and I help. Or at least, I try to. That's what I do," he mumbled, looking down at the ground. "But if you're going to shoot me, just go ahead and show an old man his life's been some cosmic mistake."

The Doctor looked up after a moment of silence to see the bowmen with their bows relaxed and barbs pointed downwards, staring at the Doctor in wonder. Even Galdor seemed star-struck. "Could you be…are you…were you sent from the Timeless Halls?"

The Doctor paused, and gave a shrug. "If you like," he replied, not about to look a gift horse in the mouth. The company of archers immediately took a knee, Galdor ahead of them, and bowed their heads in supplication.

"O, spirit of Eru," Galdor whispered, his voice almost a sob, "how we have prayed for deliverance from the Black Foe! Show us, My Lord," he said, raising his head to look the Doctor in the eye, "show us how we might beat back this abomination!"

"Oh, for-get up!" the Doctor huffed, grabbing Galdor by the shoulders and hauling him to his feet. "And the rest of you, come on! That armour's dirty enough." One by one the bowmen staggered to their feet, nonplussed.

"You have come just in time, My Lord," Galdor continued.

"Doctor," the Doctor interrupted him. "For someone who was so keen for my name a while ago, you seem awfully shy of using it."

"Doctor," Galdor repeated, bowing his head slightly. "The situation could not be worse. Morgoth's forces amass at our northern border-"

"Yes, yes, yes" the Doctor hurried him along, striding past him and breaking through the rank of archers, who split with autonomic precision to allow him passage. "All is lost, enemy at the gates, all the usual stuff. My only question is…is there anywhere where you can tell me all of this  _very_ interesting story which isn't in the middle of a freezing forest?" The Doctor asked, holding hands under his arms. Galdor nodded.

"To the Havens," he ordered his men, who immediately formed a cohort and marched double-time towards the forest's edge. "I must confess, Doctor," Galdor said to his guest confidentially as he led him to the front of the company, "I did not expect the affairs of Middle-Earth to be so unknown in the Timeless Halls."

"Oh, it's nothing personal," the Doctor replied, "they're just…very busy, those Halls. You know?" Galdor, though clearly alarmed, nodded politely.

The short journey to the Havens of Sirion passed in silence, but for the stomp of regimented footsteps and the whirr and whistle of the Doctor's sonic screwdriver, occasionally taking readings of their surroundings. Something in the air troubled him; a hint of forces at play which far outstripped the knights-in-armour look of his hosts. After less than an hour the city reared into view – a city, albeit, in name only. A small fishing and trading port which had obviously been forced to expand faster than it could manage, the solid marble at its heart had quickly been enveloped by buildings of wood and thatch, and further out still ramshackle hovels nailed together from whatever materials that could be found. The Doctor's hearts ached as he recognised exactly what these "Havens" were – a refugee camp.

From the moment they passed through the hastily-constructed gates, bruised, broken people mobbed the soldiers, seeking alms or just begging for news. "Please," a mud-splattered woman croaked as she grabbed a bowman's arm, "what news from Dorthonion? Did any make it out alive? Any? Please!" The soldiers pressed on, unheeding of the cries or gropes of the desperate citizens until they reached the less salubrious heart of the city, with streets of grey stone and buildings of white, though decaying, marble. The Doctor was ushered into the grandest of these buildings, his name heralded loudly by Galdor to the amazement of all within. It was a huge throne room, lined by courtiers of what seemed like several different species; some tall and ethereal, one or two very short and heavily-bearded, and most seeming essentially human. At its head, a young man with a serious face sat tiredly in a throne upon a small dais, watching the procession with only passing interest.

"Lord Eärendil!" Galdor called out as they reached the throne. "Eru has sent us salvation! One of His emissaries, from the Timeless Halls, came to us in the forests of Nimbrethil!" The entire court gasped as one, an intake of breath so huge the Doctor could have sworn he felt faint.

"He's a bit…small, isn't he?" One of the short, bearded figures by the throne murmured. The Doctor's eyebrows almost flew off his face in surprise.

"Well, look who's talking, Grumpy!" He shot back, to a mixture of shock and laughter.

"I assure you," Galdor said, stepping forward, "with my own eyes I saw him appear, as out of thin air, in the forest."

"And you led him here?" A dour-faced man, stepping almost from darkness behind the throne, addressed the Elf. "How do we know he isn't one of Morgoth's minions?" A low murmur of assent passed around the room.

"Forgive me, Lord Bregor, but I believe a minion of the Enemy, sent to undo us, would seem…" he paused, glancing briefly to the Doctor, "…more attractive."

"Oh, it's just Charm City, this place, isn't it?" The Doctor muttered. "No wonder you don't have any friends."

"Forgive me, my Lord," Galdor replied, bowing lowly.

"I said, stop that!" The Doctor snapped. "And  _that!_ " He added, gesturing Galdor to stand straight.

"And you say  _this_  is an emissary of Eru Iluvátar?" Bregor drawled, stepping slowly down the dais. "Where is the beauty and grace of Melian, whose power for so long protected Doriath from the Enemy? If he were sent by the will of Eru himself, would he not send his fairest and mightiest servant?"

"In my experience, fair and mighty," the Doctor interjected, " _very_  rarely go together."

"I do not recall you being given permission to speak, stranger," Bregor said slowly, looking over the Doctor with a keen, scrutinising eye the colour and hardness of flint. He was not quite yet of advanced years, but the lines on his face and balding pate spoke of years of hardship. "You speak in riddles like an Elf, yet you dress and act like one of the barbarians from across the Blue Mountains. You are no servant of the Secret Fire," he spat, turning his back on the doctor and crossing to the side of the throne, kneeling slowly. "My Lord, surely you agree that this… _stranger_ is not from the Timeless Halls?"

Silence fell anew while Eärendil lifted his head, slowly and deliberately. He regarded the Doctor with glazed, uninterested eyes. "If Eru should care enough of our troubles to send one of His emissaries," he said, "why has He not come Himself to save us?" A shocked murmur went around the court at this blasphemy while Bregor nodded enthusiastically, regarding the Doctor with a poisonous look.

"You know what?" the Doctor called out, addressing the crowd. "He's right. You're right to suspect me. I don't know what's going on here," he announced to the court. "I don't know who you are, or who this Morgoth chap is," he continued, eliciting another gasp and looks to the heavens from the courtiers. "But I do know trouble when I see it. And you're in trouble, aren't you? Streets full of scared,  _scared_ people, at their wits' end; a city of slums fit to burst with all those fleeing the darkness. I've seen it before," he said, ascending the dais to look eye-to-eye with the young man on the throne amid a flurry of hands reaching uncertainly for weapons. "I want to help. Will you let me?"

Eärendil met the Doctor's gaze. His bright blue eyes seemed empty, lacking some vital spark that gives breath to life. "You can't help," he murmured, standing up slowly. "No-one can," he barked as he walked back into his chambers, waving a hand to dismiss his courtiers. The Doctor turned this way and that on the dais as people poured out of the room, leaving him standing alone by the throne.

"Well, that went well!" The Doctor shouted. "You'd think people would be more grateful for help from a madman who fell out of the sky!" The courtiers ignored him, averting their eyes as armed guards approached from the walls to surround him.

"Guards," Bregor said with a satisfied drawl, "arrest this man." Rough hands clasped the Doctor's arms and held them tight as he struggled vainly against their strength.

"My Lord Bregor!" Galdor protested. "Servant of Eru or not, this is hardly the way to treat a guest!"

"The Lord of the Havens commands it!" Bregor shouted back. "Do not question my authority, Captain Galdor, unless you want to go with him!" Galdor bit his tongue and stood to attention, seething silently. "Take him to the dungeon," Bregor muttered dismissively, before disappearing into the Lord's chambers.

"My offer still stands!" The Doctor cried out after him as the guards marched him away and down a dark, twisting set of stone steps. "You need help, and I can give it to you! I know what it is you're facing! Well…I think I know! Okay, it's more of a general idea, but coming from me, that's a  _very_ safe bet!"

"I think that's more than enough out of you," a gruff voice amongst the guards murmured, and the last thing the Doctor remembered was a sharp pain in the back of his head and a filthy, muck-streaked stone floor, framed by iron bars.


	3. Chapter 3

The Doctor opened his eyes into smoky darkness, shot through with moonbeams. The bitter night's chill gathered at his throat, whistling in through the high, barred window of his cell as he rolled painfully onto his side and gathered himself.

"When in doubt," he grumbled, "brain the newcomer and sling him in a cell. Feudalism, it's always so…passé."

"Thank the Gods," a familiar voice at his side said. "I had worried you might not recover, and they would not let me tend to you." Through clearing vision, the Doctor made out Galdor's form, kneeling on the other side of the bars.

"Oh, don't worry," the Doctor groaned as he hauled himself up into a sitting position, wincing as the cold stones chilled him even through his jacket. "I think I've an immunity to being hit over the head by now. I don't suppose you've the keys, have you?"

Galdor shook his head sadly. "The Night Commander alone holds those. Surely, though, no cell can hold the likes of you?"

The Doctor rolled his eyes. "If I had a penny," he mumbled.

Galdor sighed, resting his forehead against the cool iron bars. The Elf Captain, at their first meeting so threatening and imperious, had seemed only more vulnerable, more desperate, throughout their short acquaintance. "Is there," he asked, "nothing I can do?"

"Well," the Doctor said, pulling one leg up beneath his chin, "you can tell me what's going on here, for a start. I'd like to at least know  _why_  your friend up there saw fit to imprison me."

Galdor let out a short laugh of surprise. "Do you truly not know? How can it be that any of Eru's servants are unaware of our plight?"

"I shouldn't really be telling you this," the Doctor replied, "but you're not the only coconut-shy at the fairground." Galdor wore a blank look of confusion. "The universe is big," the Doctor explained, "far, far bigger than you can imagine. There are things in it that'd make your hair curl. But enough of that," he trailed off, clocking the Elf's growing look of concern. "Just…tell me who this Morgoth type is. Let me know why, in this world, an honourable man would have no qualms killing someone he just met," he asked, his steely eye meeting Galdor's gaze and making the Elf blanch with shame.

"Morgoth is…evil," Galdor replied flatly. "Incarnate. He exists only to mar and destroy Eru's creation; to maim and kill his Children, until all comes to smoking ruin beneath the iron feet of his legions."

"Oh, I've heard it before," the Doctor replied, rubbing his aching head. " _The Enemy is evil, we're the good guys, honest guv_."

"He  _is_ evil!" Galdor replied, gripping a bar with his hand. "For five hundred years he has made every effort to destroy the race of the Eldar; he captures and tortures our kind, turning them into his foul demons, which he unleashes upon the cities of Beleriand. His evil nature has even turned Elf against Elf – for the right to possess the Jewels which he wears in his crown, the sons of their maker, Fëanor, have sworn an oath to destroy whosoever would hold one and keep it from them – even if they be their own kin," he spat.

"Must be special, these Jewels," the Doctor replied, cocking an eyebrow.

"More special than any of the stars in the firmament above," Galdor said wistfully. "They are called the Silmarilli among my kind; the most wondrous, lustrous gems that were ever fashioned by the hands of any on Arda. Three, there were; Morgoth stole them from Fëanor and slew his father – our first King, Finwë – and ever since he has been bent on the destruction of the Elves. For four hundred years we held him in siege at his fortress in Angband, but…" Galdor's mouth shut into a tight line. "We are failing," he hissed, his voice a desperate, quiet cry of pain. "For over a century he has pushed us further and further south, razing and destroying every country in his path; Dorthonion, Gondolin, Doriath…all fallen to his hordes. Now, we are all that is left…and our end will come sooner rather than later."

"So why," the Doctor asked, "is your boss up there so unwilling to accept whatever help he can get?"

Galdor sighed heavily. "One of the three was wrested from Morgoth's grasp eighty years ago and, for a time, it resided here, in the keeping of the Lord's wife, Elwing. Two years past, two of the sons of Fëanor – Maedhros and Maglor – assaulted the Havens with a large host. Elwing cast herself into the sea with the Jewel rather than allow the sons of Fëanor their prize, and in their wrath they killed thousands…including my brother," he muttered, his mind temporarily cast back to the carnage. "He gave his life protecting Lord Eärendil's young sons, Elros and Elrond…such fair, sweet children," he whispered. "They were taken hostage, and the Lord has not seen them since. It was that day he lost the will to continue."

"And I'm guessing that's the day Lord Bregor started talking on his behalf?" The Doctor asked. Galdor nodded solemnly. "No…more, I need more. Who is Morgoth?  _What_ is Morgoth? And  _don't_ say he's evil again – don't give me the legend, give me the man."

Galdor paused before breaking into a desperate, almost giddy laugh. "Man? You think him a mere man? Morgoth is of the Valar," he explained, a joyless smile fixed to his face. His eyebrows rose almost off his face as the Doctor shrugged. "They are the first and greatest of Eru's children. He and his siblings came into this world when it was new and it was they who greeted the Elves when we awoke; they are mighty beyond measure, wise beyond comprehension, and Morgoth is the most powerful of them all. He stands twenty feet from toe to crown, his voice has toppled mountains and his-"

"Oh, here we go," the Doctor groaned , "the exaggeration. Very common in primitive societies, to ascribe god-like attributes to their enemies – no offense."

"I do not exaggerate!" Galdor replied, standing and looming threateningly over the Doctor, his temper beginning to fray. "I have seen him with my own eyes, and it is a monstrous sight to behold! When the High King of the Noldor, Fingolfin, challenged him to single combat outside the gates of his fortress, I watched on as our greatest warrior fell to his mace; as the Dark Lord crushed the life out of him with his foot, as easily as a child would an insect. Almost one hundred years have passed since that day, and I never-"

"Hold on," the Doctor interrupted him, "what?"

"I said, I never-"

"No, no, not that, before, when you were interesting!" The Doctor said, leaping to his feet. "A hundred years, you say?"

Galdor looked at him, nonplussed. "Almost," he replied. "Ninety-five years next month."

The Doctor stared at Galdor, deep and scrutinising. "No," he replied with a wide, toothy grin. "Not possible. There's no way you're a day over forty."

Galdor sighed tersely, feeling his patience wearing thin. Were he not convinced the strange old man was an emissary of Eru, he'd have left him here to rot by now. "I am six hundred and twenty-five years old," he replied.

"No chance," the Doctor replied. "Only one humanoid species in the universe has a lifespan that extreme, and you're talking to one."

Galdor's mouth opened and closed, overwhelmed by the incomprehensible words that left the old man's lips, before deciding to ignore them altogether. "I am not even the oldest Elf in the Havens," he replied, eyeing the Doctor suspiciously, his faith in him beginning to strain for the first time. "Círdan the Shipwright lives just across the water, on the Isle of Balar; he is over ten thousand years old. Some even believe he was one of the first of our kind."

The Doctor stepped towards the bars, eyeing Galdor up. "Impossible," he breathed, reaching into his jacket pocket and whipping out the Sonic Screwdriver, making the Elf jump backwards as he gave him a quick scan. "Or…perhaps…" he muttered as he read the readings.

"What was that?" Galdor demanded.

"Sonic screwdriver," the Doctor replied as he fiddled with the settings, making the sonic screech and whistle. "My magic wand, if you like. Only there's nothing magic at all about this place – I knew it!" he called out, chasing an invisible signal around the cell. "Technology. It's everywhere. All over this place, all over this  _planet_ \- invisible, subtle, but everywhere. Even you," he said, pointing to the Elf with the screwdriver. "I don't know exactly how, but someone has woven some kind of highly advanced technology into the very fabric of this world; technology that brings the impossible to life."

Galdor stood stunned. "I don't understand what any of that means," he said.

"Ah, well, you're only human. Or not," the Doctor muttered as he pointed the sonic at the lock on the door, which popped and opened noisily. He stepped outside and clapped Galdor on the shoulder. "I think we should go and have another chat with this Lord Eärendil, now he doesn't have your man Bregor hovering over his shoulder…or does he, do you know?" The Doctor asked warily.

"How…how did you-" Galdor spluttered.

"Magic wand," the Doctor replied, waving the sonic as he disappeared up the stairs, Galdor chasing after him.

"But you asked me if I had the keys!"

"I knew you didn't," the Doctor whispered as they emerged into the corridor, scanning left and right for guards. "If you did, you wouldn't have been kneeling by the bars like a lemon."

"What's a-no," Galdor interrupted himself. "Why, then, did you sit in captivity when you could have freed yourself at any time?" The Doctor caught the Elf's gaze.

"Because I needed to hear the facts from your lips," he replied. "I needed to believe you. And I do," he went on, trotting out into the corridor and beckoning Galdor to follow him. "To an extent, anyway. I don't doubt this Morgoth is hardly going to win Man of the Year any time soon, but a god?" The Doctor shook his head. "The universe is never that simple."

"What do you mean?" Galdor hissed as they ducked into a culvert together, the Doctor's nose pressed almost flush against the tall Elf's collarbone.

"I mean," the Doctor replied in a nasal whisper, "there's something else going on here. This is not the work of magic, but machines – very, very old machines, but like nothing I've seen in many, many years."

"I don't understand," Galdor mumbled, shaking his head in frustration.

"That's alright, you don't have to," the Doctor replied. "Just get me out of here and back to where you found me."

"I thought we were going to see-"

"We are," The Doctor replied, cajoling his increasingly more confused companion. "But in order to do that, first we need to get back to where you found me. The TARDIS, remember?"

"Follow me," Galdor said, leading the way with certainty. For some minutes they tip-toed around winding stone corridors before leaving the fortress through a side door, at which point the Doctor felt Galdor wrap something tightly around his neck.

"What do you think you're doing, you treacherous-oh," he babbled before noticing Galdor had slung his cloak about the Doctor's shoulders, fastening it with a brooch at his throat.

"The Havens are full of spies," Galdor whispered as he pulled the hood up over the Doctor's head, obscuring his face. "Nearly all of them Bregor's." He gestured the Doctor to follow him and the two made quick, silent progress through the old town, its marble shining a brilliant blue beneath the full moon. It was when they got into the hastily-constructed shanties around its edges, however, that their flight became more difficult. Entire streets were impassable mud wallows, or so built-up with encroaching shelters that they had become dead-ends overnight.

"How many people live here?" The Doctor asked quietly as they took the long way around a collapsed building.

"We cannot be certain. Tens of thousands," Galdor replied. "Perhaps even a hundred. Tenfold what the city was built to bear. All of Beleriand has poured through our gates over the last ten years; there is nowhere else," he said sadly. "In such conditions, disease is everywhere. The Edain – the men-folk – they succumb to sickness at a rate so overwhelming we barely have time or space to bury them."

"You don't, though?" The Doctor asked after a few moments of despondent silence. "Your people?"

"The Eldar are tied to the fate of the world," Galdor said. "We do not sicken, and by the time we reach one hundred years we are as grown as we shall ever be. Some of our very oldest appear as the elderly of the Edain do; however, these are rare indeed."

"Rare indeed," the Doctor replied under his breath. The more he learned about this strange race and their world, the more confusing and impossible it all seemed. Tens of thousands of years old? A war waged by living gods? It seemed pure fantasy. Eventually the two reached the edge of the conurbations, an unmanned gate-house consisting of tree branches crudely lashed together to form a makeshift bar. As the Doctor untied horses from nearby hitching rail, Galdor hefted the heavy bar out of the way to clear their path.

"The alarm has not been raised," Galdor whispered as they mounted their steeds. "You have not yet been missed."

As if on cue, a mighty horn blasted out from the city behind them, echoing down the ramshackle streets of the sprawl. Shouts echoed towards them as the city guard formed and fanned out. "Well, how's that for timing," the Doctor said with a mad grin. "Hi-ho, Silver!" His horse reared and sped off into the night, followed closely by Galdor, hooves thumping and thudding on damp ground as the city disappeared behind them.


	4. Chapter 4

Galdor and the Doctor abandoned their cloaks and horses at the edge of the wood, trusting the Elf's innate sense of direction to get them to the TARDIS through the thick trees.

"We will be easily tracked," Galdor called out to the Doctor as he shinned up a tree to get a better line of sight. "They will be less than an hour behind us."

"I know," the Doctor replied, skidding nervously down a mossy incline. "But by the time they get to where we're going, we'll be long gone." Galdor dropped from the tree and fixed the Doctor with another uncertain look.

"You speak in riddles," he said, "constantly." The Doctor clapped him on the shoulder.

"Get used to it."

Minutes passed in silence as Galdor retraced his steps back to the clearing where the Doctor had landed, broken only by the crunch of morning frost beneath their feet. The sun had begun to rise, breaking through the canopy in thin shafts and washing the wood in monochrome. Black earth, brown wood, green leaves, all seemed the same shade of grey in the demi-light, but the deep blue of the TARDIS shone out like a beacon in the distance.

"So your plan," Galdor addressed the Doctor as they entered the clearing, "to escape Brego's soldiers...is to hide in a box?" The Doctor shrugged.

"It's always worked for me before," he muttered as he pulled the key from his pocket and unlocked the door, bundling himself inside. "Come on!" he called back. Galdor took a step back, a deep sense of unease gripping him as he watched the old man disappear into a box no wider than his arm.

"I'll...stand guard, if it's all the same to you," he called inside, his stomach turning uneasily as his voice echoed as though he'd just shouted into a cave.

"No problem," the Doctor replied, again as though from far away. "When they catch up with us, I assume you'll be doing the talking." Galdor cursed under his breath. Everything about this... _thing_ made his skin crawl, as though it were fundamentally wrong. But, gritting his teeth, he took that fateful step over the threshold, and found himself in a corridor.

He looked behind him; the outside world was still there, bright and cold as it had been just a minute ago. Yet the corridor stretched forward for far, far longer than the box; tentatively, he walked to the end of the corridor and was greeted by a sight more wondrous than even the presence of the Valar themselves.

In a mighty circular hall, walkways curled in concentric rings downwards into the centre, where some magical device stood tall and imposing, stretching up to the ceiling. There, metal wheels turned within each other and met the device's central shaft, which rose and fell with beautiful, mingling lights to the sounds of waves, wind, and the turn of the earth itself. Galdor stood, transfixed, until the impossibility of it all overwhelmed him and he dashed back outside, bending double to catch his breath.

"Devilry," he gasped. "Morgoth's trickery!"

"No," the Doctor said calmly, appearing at the doorway like a ghost. Galdor flinched and scurried backwards. "Quite the opposite." The Elf drew his sword. The Doctor's face barely flickered.

"Can I trust you, Doctor?" Galdor said.

"I think we're past  _that_ cliché," the Doctor replied, stepping out of the TARDIS to within striking distance. His cold, hard eyes bored deep into Galdor's. "I don't have time to explain it to you, and even if I did, I don't think you'd understand. All you need to know is that I agree with you. This world is in indescribable danger, and I want to help you." Galdor's grip on his sword tightened for a moment, before he dropped his guard. "Attaboy," the Doctor muttered wryly as he turned and re-entered the TARDIS, with Galdor now right behind him.

"What do I…" Galdor mumbled, overawed once more by the might and splendour of the TARDIS' interior. "How can I help?"

"Sit down," the Doctor replied. "Shut up. Get out of my way. For the next few minutes, at least." He inserted the screwdriver into a port on the console which whistled in response, sending lights blinking across its face. "I've half an idea what's going on here," he said, more to himself than Galdor. "Well...more like a quarter. Maybe two-fifths."

Galdor gripped the rail that run around the central console and leant on it heavily. The old man spoke mystical gibberish, and he was in a box the size of a cavern. It was all slightly too much for him.

"I never saw the Trees," he said out loud, transfixed by the soft, mingling lights of the console's column. "Those of us who did always described first the beauty of their light; how they waxed and waned, gold and silver in their turn, by day and night. My mother said," he continued, clearing his throat, "that in the hour when Telperion and Laurelin's lights mixed perfectly, it was as if...perfection itself became more perfect. That for a short while every day, we all forgot what little troubles we had and bathed in the glow of...pure bliss." He stood watching the lights for a few more seconds before noticing the Doctor watching him from the corner of his eye.

"You realise what you're doing?" The Doctor asked softly. Galdor shook his head. "Not helping!" The Doctor pushed past him brusquely to fiddle with a few of the innumerable knobs and buttons that covered the console. "Look at you - you don't even realise it, you lot! You're still using swords and bows and arrows, but the level of technology in this world, it's...it's off the scale," he thundered, clattering his way back around the console. "I can't get a full reading from down here, we need to go up."

"Up?" Galdor repeated, unconsciously holding onto the rail once more as the Doctor threw open a switch and took hold of a large, wooden lever.

"Up!"

The floor lurched away from Galdor's feet as the Doctor threw the lever, sending the room spinning. The TARDIS rose with a roar, through clouds and ice and lightning, buffeting and juddering almost out of control.

"What are you doing?" Galdor shouted over the chaos. "What's happening?" The Doctor laughed maniacally as they rose higher and higher, touching the very edge of space.

"I love a thunderstorm!" He called out, grinning like a child at Christmas. "I really should do this more often, it's terribly bracing! Oh...speaking of, hold on!" The Doctor looped his arm around the rail, prompting Galdor to do the same. An explosion rocked the hall, sending sparks flying and the TARDIS spinning like a top. Galdor stretched his legs out to try and find some purchase on anything solid.

"Is this going to be over soon?" The Elf shouted as the Doctor battled to his feet to try and stabilise the TARDIS.

"Any second...now!" The Doctor called out, and all at once the shaking ceased. Galdor got gingerly back to his feet in a foul mood.

"That's it," he raged, making his way back to the door. "I'll take my chances outside."

"I wouldn't," the Doctor replied casually, staring intently at a screen.

"Why not?" Galdor scoffed, opening the door. "At least there the ground doesn't disappear from under your fe-" A choked scream echoed throughout the TARDIS.

"Told you," the Doctor replied. Galdor stood with one leg wrapped around the unopened door, clinging on for dear life as all of Arda stretched out beneath him, with the endless expanse of the stars framing the pearlescent world. Black clouds obscured the Northern wastes where Morgoth's fortress lay, hidden beneath the smoking triple peaks of the mountain Thangorodrim. Slowly peeling himself away from the door, Galdor went toppling backwards as his legs gave out.

"H-h-h…" he whimpered, scrambling backwards. "H-h-how?" He groaned, managing to stretch his question out over several seconds.

"We're approximately a hundred miles above the surface of your world," the Doctor explained as he tapped furiously at the screen. "I had to get into orbit to take a really detailed scan of the place."

"That," Galdor replied, unable to tear his eyes from the sight of his planet turning serenely beneath him, "is not what I asked! That's 'where' and 'why'! I asked, 'HOW'!"

The Doctor straightened up and turned to face Galdor. "It flies," he said casually, gesturing around, before returning to his work without another word. Galdor nodded dumbly.

"Of course it does," he whimpered, letting the madness wash over him. It was easier to just go with the flow than to expect anything even slightly normal from this point.

"Come on," the Doctor grumbled, using the sonic screwdriver to flick through settings on the viewscreen. "Stop being stubborn. You eat stuff like this for breakfast."

"How does this help us get to Lord Eärendil?" Galdor asked, back to his feet and striding purposefully back to the console.

"Hm? Oh, it doesn't," the Doctor replied dismissively. "This is just for my own curiosity. Patience." Galdor let out a loud sigh and sat on the railing.

"The Edain believe the Gods to be mad, you know," he told the Doctor. "It's how they explain their unwillingness to intercede in this slaughter."

"People need their coping mechanisms," the Doctor replied, distracted. "People need to think that, no matter how awful the situation, it was 'written'. Religion and prophecy are the most powerful forces in the universe. What makes you say that, anyway?"

Galdor smiled. "Having met you, I think I'm starting to think they're right," he replied. They just don't understand," he continued. "They did not know the Gods as we did. They never stood in their presence as we did...never walked with them through the gardens of Taniquetil, nor shared words under the light of the Trees. This alone was my peoples' gift...and we spurned it," he finished bitterly.

"Spurned it how?"

"When Morgoth stole the Silmarils from Feanor and slew his father, the Gods forbade him to make war on Morgoth, as he was one of their own. Feanor disobeyed the Gods, and a curse was put upon his house - they are doomed to rack and ruin, and with them, so are we. These are the last days of my race," he muttered.

"When you say you stood in their presence," the Doctor asked, never taking his eyes from the screen, "I assume you don't mean that literally?" Galdor's brows furrowed in confusion.

"Of course I do," he replied. "Manwë, High Lord of the Valar, would walk upon earthly feet amongst us regularly, as would many of his brethren - Nienna, Lady of Sorrow, was most often our guest. And blessed Elbereth, his wife…" Galdor paused. "We miss her most of all." Galdor looked up to find the Doctor's wild eyes locked with his own.

"If there's one thing I know about gods," the Doctor said, "it's that real ones never show up. It's all augury and secret whispers - file under Mysterious Ways, Moves In. But a god who shows his face?" The Doctor broke into a mad grin. "Not buying it. And neither should you," he continued, swinging the screen around to Galdor. "Look at it. Absolutely packed to the gills with technology - the entire planet is surrounded in a time field. Something's taken you out of your rightful time and place - possibly even a parallel universe - and has stuck you here, at a point in time where the universe is barely out of nappies. I'll wager those 'gods' of yours have something to do with it." Galdor's wide-eyed stare shifted the smile from the Doctor's face. "But that can wait, I suppose. Let's have a word with the boss."

* * *

_My Lord, you must come with us!_

_Sir, please!_

_No! Not my sons! NOT MY BOYS!_

Eärendil woke, as he so often did, to the sound of children's screams. With every day that had passed since his loss, the wound felt deeper and keener, like a stone in a shoe that burrows its way into the flesh. He was momentarily disorientated by the near-total darkness of his chamber, his tired eyes seeking the thin sliver of moonlight that bled through the shutters. Pushing himself up on his headrest, he buried his face in his hands and began to sob silently.

"Now, if you're anything like me, the nightmares won't have started until about the third day," came a voice in the darkness. "And that's only because that's the first time you were able to actually sleep."

"Who's there?" Eärendil called out, tremulous with fear. "Show yourself!"

"Why is it," the voice continued, "that men like you are brave alone in bed at night, but let sycophants and tyrants run roughshod over them by day? They say character is what we are in the dark. What does that make you?"

The sharp sound of a knife being pulled from its sheath cut the air. "It makes me the Lord of Mouths of Sirion," Eärendil replied, "and it makes you very close to dying unless you show yourself immediately."

The Doctor's cragged face slowly emerged into the shaft of moonlight that bathed the bed. "Been there," he replied. "Done that."

Eärendil's snarl slowly melted, replaced by a look of confusion. "You...you came before me in the courtroom today," he said, his grip on his knife faltering slightly. "Galdor thought you were one of the Maiar."

"I did, Lord," Galdor replied, stepping forward to appear behind the Doctor in the moonlight. "I do," he corrected himself, before taking a knee. "Apologies for our intrusion, but I believe the Doctor represents our best hope of turning the tide against Morgoth."

"How did you get in here?" Eärendil asked angrily, regaining some of his confidence. "The door is guarded by four soldiers! If you've harmed any of them-"

"Oh, relax," the Doctor said, striding around to the other side of the bed. "They don't even know we're here - well, as long as you keep your voice down, which I think would be a good idea." A strange trill filled the air before a candle at the side of the burst into life, flooding the room with deep golden light. In the far corner of the bare-walled chamber, the TARDIS stood, imposingly large against the rest of the meagre possessions in it - for a Lord, the Doctor thought, he seemed remarkably resilient to the temptation of luxury.

"Wh-what is-"

"TARDIS, spaceship, flies, doesn't do walls," the Doctor explained hurriedly. "Not the point. The point is, you never answered my question," he continued, hopping into bed and sitting upright next to Eärendil, who thrust his knife just inches from the Doctor's throat, wild-eyed. "I  _know_ you're in trouble. I can help. Do you want it?"

Eärendil stared at the intruder in his room - in his  _bed_ \- with ragged breaths, every fibre in his body telling him to thrust his hand forward. But the deeper he stared into the Doctor's eyes, he sensed he began to feel something of what had swayed Galdor - ever the most level-headed and loyal of his officers - at work in himself. Stars were born and died within them, years beyond the telling of any Elf lay behind them.

"How?" he whispered through clenched teeth.

"Well, first," the Doctor replied, bounding back up off the bed and straightening his jacket, "you're going to need to put me in contact with these Gods of yours."

Eärendil shook his head, rubbing his eyes. "What?" He asked, incredulous.

"The Doctor seeks audience with the Valar," Galdor explained, sounding almost embarrassed. Eärendil laughed aloud.

"And you say he comes from the Timeless Halls?" He replied. "He knows nothing!"

"Knowing nothing's no crime," the Doctor replied, his voice suddenly harsher. "Avoiding learning, that's the killer. So, teach me. Why is this idea laughable?"

"The Curse of Feanor," Galdor explained. "As I said, after Feanor led his campaign against Morgoth out of Valinor, the Valar forbade any from returning. They will no longer heed the pleas of Middle-Earth."

The Doctor regarded Galdor with a strange smirk. "They'll heed me."

"You don't understand," Galdor replied, frustrated. "Their lands are...lost to us, now. Ships which attempt to reach Aman are drowned in the sea or lost to the Halls of Mandos. We are forbidden from ever seeing our homeland again."

The Doctor raised a bushy eyebrow. "Lost, you say?" He said, pacing up and down the foot of the bed. "What if I told you I could find it again?"

"I'd wonder what you wanted for it," Eärendil replied cynically. The Doctor grinned mischievously.

"You," he said. "I'm not doing all your legwork - I'll get you in, but you're the one who talks to them. Comes a time when a man has to look a god in the eye, and see him for what he really is."

Eärendil bowed his head, muttering darkly. "He speaks blasphemies," he growled.

"He is our only hope," Galdor pleaded with his Lord. A foul silence fell as Eärendil thumbed his blade, eyes swivelling to the door. One shout and his men would come running.

"I had children once, you know," the Doctor said into the still. "A long, long time ago. I lost them," he muttered, running his finger along the smooth wood of the bedpost. "One of many reasons I do what I do.  _The Finder of Lost Children_ , I'm called by one civilisation." The Doctor broke into a wide smile, his eyes lined with pain. "Irony. It's universal."

Eärendil's chest swelled as he tapped the knife on the bedsheets nervously. "You give me your word that you can do this?" The Doctor nodded.

"I can get you there," he said. "But the rest is up to you."

Eärendil nodded and slowly returned the knife to its sheath hanging on the bedpost, before rising from his bed. "I'll need my armour," he said, "if I'm to address the Lord of the Valar as an equal."

"Of course, my Lord," Galdor replied, bowing and leaving to fetch Eärendil's armour.

"I'll get the engine started," the Doctor said to no-one in particular, opening the door to the TARDIS.

"Will I see my sons again?" Eärendil asked the Doctor, his bravado stripped with the exit of his officer. He stood half-naked and hunched in the moonlight, painting his body pallid.

"I don't do prophecy," the Doctor replied. "All I can do is help to end this war."

"Why now?" Eärendil said. "This war has raged for five hundred years, with the loss of near a million lives - Man, Elf and Dwarf, all. Why interfere now, when we are so few as to make our victory almost meaningless?"

"No victory," the Doctor said softly, stepping closer, "is ever meaningless. As to why now?" He broke into another mad, toothy grin. "Maybe someone up there likes you."


	5. Chapter 5

Eärendil slid his knife slowly from its jewelled scabbard and replaced it with a satisfying click. He repeated the action three or four times, each time turning the knife just enough to make sure the metal hissed as it left the sheath. It tuned his mind, he claimed; the ritualistic sharpening of the blade allowed him to envision his obstacles as thorny vines before his path, cut down by his own hand.

"If you do that one more time," the Doctor finally broke, "I swear, I'll turn this TARDIS around and we'll all go home!" Galdor's body tensed as he watched a fraught look pass between the Doctor, hunched over the TARDIS console, and Eärendil, slumped on the steps leading to the door like a bored child.

"You might as well," Eärendil replied. "You claimed you could get me to Valinor, but it seems I was wrong to trust that mad-sounding scheme; you've been tinkering with that thing for over an hour! I don't know what I was thinking."

"Most people don't," the Doctor replied, "in general. And I stand by my offer - I can definitely get you to where you want to go, it just might take a little bit of time." His bushy eyebrows knitted together in frustration as he punched numbers into the console. "You've had some real cowboys mucking with this planet."

"Cowboys?" Eärendil repeated. The Doctor's eyes flickered upwards, almost embarrassed.

"That was another life talking," he muttered. "You remember what I said about there being alien forces at work on your world?"

"I remember it; still don't understand it," Eärendil replied drolly.

"Well, if you're being truthful about there being a continent to the west of your own, I don't know what they've done with it," the Doctor said, spinning the screen around to show Eärendil a map of the planet - a single, massive continent dominated one side of the globe, with endless water on either side. Eärendil slowly rose, shaking his head.

"No," he muttered, "that's...that's not right. Aman is there," he told the Doctor. "There are Eldar in the Havens who were born there, who lived there. They walked to Middle-Earth from there!  _Walked!_ Across a hundred leagues of ice!"

The Doctor sighed in frustration and sat on the rail, rubbing his temples. "Continents don't just disappear," he said. "Even the most perfect cloaking device leaves a trace, like the thread of an unravelling scarf - but there's so much interference on this planet, that I don't even know where to begin. You're being controlled," he told his companions, "by forces far beyond your comprehension. And mine," he muttered. "Almost."

"Morgoth is a force beyond all comprehension," Galdor ventured.

"So you keep telling me," the Doctor replied. "But it just doesn't add up to me - there's something I'm missing, something you're all missing. You told me," he said to Galdor, "that Morgoth is as kin to these Valar, these gods of yours."

"That is so," Galdor replied.

"And these Valar are kindly sorts - loving, nurturing, come round for tea and crumpets on Sunday, right?"

"Yes."

"But powerful, am I right?" The Doctor pressed him, advancing.

"Beyond measure," Galdor said, stiffening slightly.

"But your man Morgoth steals the greatest achievement of your race, and murders their creator's father," the Doctor continued, eyeballing the Elf. "So he launches a crusade to reclaim his rightful property, and avenge his father's death - all very noble, stirring stuff. But your gods' response is to forbid him from doing so, and banish your entire race? What does that tell you?"

"That Fëanor was a fool to disobey the Valar," Eärendil piped up before Galdor could respond.

"Could be," the Doctor countered, wheeling to face him. "Or could be that either these Valar aren't quite the selfless paragons they'd like you to think they are - always possible, these are people who call themselves Gods, after all - or they have a vested interest in making sure these...Silmarils stay lost."

Galdor's countenance darkened. "Are you suggesting the Valar cooperated in Morgoth's crimes?"

"Not quite," the Doctor replied. "I need more information. What's so special about these jewels that a god would turn cutpurse for them?" An uncomfortable look passed between Galdor and Eärendil, as though they were silently deciding who would speak. In the end, it was the Elf who replied.

"So great a feat was the making of the Silmarils that Aule, the God of the Forge, proclaimed that not even one of the Valar would have been able to do it. Morgoth has always longed for mastery of Arda and power over his kin - he believes that possessing them gives him that power." The Doctor's brow furrowed in confusion.

"But that's ridiculous," he replied. "Surely he knows that merely possessing them doesn't give him that power, that being able to create his own would?"

Eärendil chuckled mirthlessly. "Therein lies the irony. In the process of wresting them from Fëanor, Morgoth destroyed the Two Trees, from whose light the Silmarils were forged - the one thing that could revive them. As long as he holds onto them-"

"They can never be replicated," the Doctor finished before double-taking. "Forged FROM light?" He challenged Eärendil. "Did I hear that right?" Eärendil nodded.

"The Silmarils' great beauty comes from the fact that they are the light of the Eldar crystallised - as though someone took the Sun and fashioned it into a jewel."

"You mentioned it before," the Doctor turned to Galdor. "At great length, might I add."

"It is the reason my kind came to Valinor in the first place," he explained. "That was aeons ago, years beyond the count of numbers. We first came into being far to the east, by the light of the stars, and that was the only light we ever knew until Orome the Huntsman found us. He took three of our elders - one of them being Fëanor's father, Finwe - as ambassadors, and upon their return all they spoke of was the beauty of the light of the Trees. Those of us who made the journey - the Eldar - were not disappointed," Galdor finished.

"Light," the Doctor muttered. "Trees. Jewels. There's some kind of...I just can't...yes!" he cried out, much to his companions' surprise. "That's it!"

"What's...what?" Eärendil replied.

"That's how we find your lost continent!" He shouted out as he ran around the console, pulling levers and flipping switches with abandon. "All that light, artificial starlight, shining out across the world for thousands and thousands of years - all that radiation will have leached into the soil, into the very living rock!" He threw open the throttle and the TARDIS lurched as it launched itself into the air, sending Galdor and Eärendil stumbling. "All we need is a sample of that radiation which exists in the real world, and I can extend the wavelength across the entire planet - hey presto, instant continent!"

"I don't understand!" Galdor shouted above the groan of the TARDIS' engine.

"I think I do," Eärendil said, sliding across the floor to stand beside the Doctor, "but it's impossible. It can't be done."

"Ah, my theme tune," the Doctor replied.

"The Silmarils are lost," Eärendil said. "Two lie at the heart of Morgoth's fortress, and the other…" he tailed off into silence.

"The other lies at the bottom of the ocean," the Doctor finished for him. "Hardly the dark side of the moon for this girl. Well, then again, neither's the dark side of the moon." The TARDIS came to a sudden halt, and the whirr and groan of the engines subsided to a gentle hum. "There," the Doctor said, pointing to a blip on the screen. "That's your Silmaril - just a few paces out of that door."

"H-how did you-" Eärendil stammered.

"Where there's radiation," the Doctor explained, "there's heat, and light. That's giving it out by the bucketload," he said, nodding at the screen. "I've extended the oxygen shell - all we have to do is go out there and take it."

Eärendil's eyes strayed to the door nervously, like a child checking beneath his bed for monsters. "Go out there," he repeated, "and take it."

"That's right," the Doctor replied. "Well, you'll need to dig - it's about a metre below the surface." Eärendil swallowed hard.

"Doctor, I...that Silmaril lies on the seabed because-"

"Your wife," the Doctor interrupted him, his voice warm and calm. "I know."

Eärendil turned back from the door, his face grey with horror. "Doctor," he whispered, his voice cracking with emotion, "that's her grave." Their eyes locked, silent and intense.

"I know," the Doctor replied. "I'm sorry, but-"

"Sorry?" Eärendil spat. "You fall into my Kingdom and offer us your help centuries late, you promise me audience with the Valar and then tell me I must dig up my own wife's grave to get it! What kind of madman are you?"

"Exactly the kind of madman you need," the Doctor retorted, more forcefully than before.

"I will go," Galdor piped up. The Doctor turned in surprise, having momentarily forgotten the Elf was even with them. "My duty is to serve the Lord of the Havens, and I serve him even now."

"No!" Eärendil barked, a figure of fury. "I will not see her desecrated. We find another way."

"There is," the Doctor replied, "no other way."

"You will find me one!" Eärendil bellowed, drawing his knife and slamming it into the TARDIS console, sending a spray of sparks between the two of them as Galdor flinched in shock. The Doctor barely moved as they stared each other down.

"Careful," he hissed, eyes blazing. "That's an antique." Taking a step back, he pressed a few buttons and turned the screen to face Eärendil. "Here's your other way."

"What am I looking-" Eärendil growled, before the breath froze in his throat. He suddenly slouched as though he'd been punched, and Galdor strode forward to steady his master. The Elf gasped as he watched the monitor; two dark-haired boys played with wooden swords in a tent, watched over impassively by armoured soldiers.

"Elros," Galdor whispered. "Elrond."

"How?" Eärendil gasped. "How can we-"

"The TARDIS takes a DNA scan of every living being to set foot inside it," the Doctor replied as Eärendil reached out to touch the screen, his lip quivering as tears began to prick his eyes. "Many of my companions have had...family," he mumbled.

"Take me to them," Eärendil said gruffly, trying to fill his quaking voice with fury. "Now!"

"I can't," the Doctor replied.

"Why not?"

"The interference," the Doctor said, gesticulating around him. "It's too great. I can't guarantee I'll even land within twenty feet of them."

"That's close enough for me," Eärendil said, wrenching his knife from the console and sheathing it.

"So, what, you'll just...bomb on out there and kill your way to your sons?" The Doctor challenged him. "I don't think so. Not on my TARDIS."

"Then you know nothing!" Eärendil spat. "You know nothing of what it means to lose everything you hold dear!"

"I know more about suffering than you could ever DREAM of!" The Doctor roared, his lined face becoming wild with anger, his eyes wide and furious. "You think you're the only man who's ever lost a child? In war? At least yours have the luxury of still being alive!" The two stared each other down like rutting beasts, chests heaving and breaths ragged. "And they are alive," the Doctor continued, "because of her! Because she took away the only reason their captors had to stay on your good side!" Silence fell between them, until only Eärendil's breaths and the hum of the TARDIS' engines could be heard. "If you ever want to see them again," the Doctor said softly, "we need that jewel." Eärendil took a long, shuddering breath.

"Do you swear," he said lowly, "this is the only way?"

"The only way that I can see," the Doctor replied. Eärendil nodded slowly.

"Very well."

"My Lord," Galdor interjected, "please, allow me. You should not see…" He trailed off. Eärendil sighed deeply and grasped Galdor's shoulder.

"Thank you, my friend," he whispered. Galdor inclined his head to his Lord, and turned to face the Doctor.

"What do I need to do?"

The Doctor handed Galdor a small, square device, which he eyed with suspicion. "Use this to communicate with us - just speak into it and we'll hear your voice. It will beep quicker the closer you get to the jewel. When you're right on top of it, start digging. " Galdor nodded and made his way to the door, taking a deep breath before pushing it open and stepping out gingerly.

"What do we do?" Eärendil asked the Doctor, avoiding his gaze.

"Wait," the Doctor said, leaning on the console and flicking a button on the screen. A murky grey world replaced the image of Eärendil's sons at play, with Galdor stepping lightly across an expanse of mud. The bleeps and beeps of the device he carried echoed through the TARDIS, growing quicker and quicker with every step until, after some minutes, it screeched one unbroken note.

"I've found it," Galdor's electronic voice crackled. "I'm digging now."

"I apologise for my earlier conduct," Eärendil muttered under his breath, still unable to reach the Doctor's gaze. "It was unbecoming of me."

"Don't," the Doctor replied. "I've been there."

"War changes you, doesn't it?" Eärendil said, fixing eyes with the Doctor at last. "The last few years have felt like...a nightmare. Like I'm a puppet, operated by a man I don't recognise."

"Changes you," the Doctor repeated. "It certainly does that."

"Doctor," Galdor interrupted them, his voice shaking and urgent.

"Galdor, what is it?" Earendil said. "Have you found it?"

Galdor almost dropped the communicator as he knelt by the trench he had dug, reaching out a mud-streaked hand to stroke soft, pale flesh.

"I've found the Lady Elwing," he whispered into the communicator. "I think...I think she's alive."


	6. Chapter 6

"What we are witnessing," the Doctor said, "is either a physical impossibility, or a trick."

"It's a miracle," Eärendil whispered.

"Is there an echo in here?" The Doctor replied.

Eärendil knelt on the gangway from the TARDIS' door, his long-lost wife lying peacefully before him; the white gown she had worn on the last day they had been together was tattered and filthy from years of burial beneath earth and sea, her hands still clasped tightly together over her breast, the glow of the Silmaril within breaking out between the gaps in her fingers as the strands of the necklace Nauglamir cascaded down her body. Her face, though pale, seemed as peaceful as though she were asleep; her cheeks were full and her complexion as clear any Eldar's should be. Galdor stood bent double in the doorway, hands and arms streaked and splattered with mud, getting his breath back after he and Eärendil had torn Elwing from the boggy ground. Eärendil ran his hand through her wet, straggly hair and let out a groan of longing.

"No pulse, no breath," he sighed, "but her flesh is yet warm! How is it possible?"

"It isn't," the Doctor said peevishly, turning his back on the trio and reassuming his place at the console. "By all accounts, she should be bones and fish food. But I'll bet a regeneration that it's something to do with that...thing," he spat, regarding the glow from Elwing's hands from the corner of his eye.

"Perhaps in their grace, the Valar have spared her," Galdor suggested to a dismissive laugh from the Doctor.

"Convenient," he replied, resuming his work. "In my dictionary, that's just another word for 'wrong'."

"Can you revive her?" Eärendil asked, not taking his gaze from his wife's face.

"Perhaps - once I understand how she isn't dead," the Doctor said, bowing his head deeply. "Nothing," he muttered, eyes screwed tightly shut, " _nothing_ about this planet makes sense. It's almost like the laws of physics don't apply."

"Then assume they do not!" Eärendil shouted, finally turning from Elwing. The Doctor cocked an eyebrow.

"Couple of teachers back at the Academy would have your guts for garters if they heard you talking like that," he quipped, retrieving the sonic screwdriver from his jacket pocket and bounding up the stairs to where Elwing lay. The screwdriver's electronic whistling filled the TARDIS as he scanned her body and the Silmaril, flicking it open to read the results. "Right, that's...no!...surely...how?" The Doctor said to himself, ignoring his companions as he returned to the console.

"What?" Eärendil called out after him. "What is it?" The Doctor hurried around the console, punching numbers into keyboards in near-silence as he mouthed words to himself in a frenzy. "I would have you tell me!" Eärendil demanded, taking to his feet.

"Oh, please," the Doctor snapped back at him, "if I can barely get my head around this, do you think you've got a chance? You'd have more luck trying to down the ocean in one!"

"Do  _not_ ," Eärendil hissed, leaving Elwing for the first time since they brought her aboard to descend to the console level, "patronise me, Doctor." The Doctor laid his screwdriver down, hunched over the console as he steadied himself with a few breaths.

"Look," he began, fixing Eärendil with a stern teacher's glare. "There's the  _slimmest_ chance I can figure out what's going on here and get your wife back to you. But if I'm to do that, you need to sit down, shut up, and let me. Are we clear?" Eärendil's clear blue eyes, red and sore with tears, seemed to burn with indignation before he stepped back slowly. "Thank you." The Doctor went to work, slotting the screwdriver into its socket on the console and poring through the reams of information it had absorbed from Elwing and the jewel.

"Sire," Galdor spoke softly, "if the Doctor is indeed able to return the lady Elwing to us...what shall we do with the Silmaril?"

"Concern yourself not," Eärendil replied, eagle eyes watching the Doctor at work. "I have my designs." Galdor nodded and retreated to watch over Elwing as ill-tempered silence stewed over the trio for a long minute.

"Right," the Doctor exclaimed, striding over to his companions. "I think I've got an idea."

"You  _think_?" Eärendil repeated, eyebrows raised in alarm.

"Sorry, you don't know me" the Doctor replied with a smile. "It means, shut up and listen," he finished, smile disappearing. "The jewel in her hands," the Doctor pointed. "It's emitting radiation, just like I said earlier. That radiation is enveloping her in a cocoon that's somehow preserving her, like - like plating a blade so it won't rust," he explained, hoping his analogy would work. "I'm not sure how, but I'm picking up two distinct time streams in this room - one is from us, and the other is localised around her. That's why she isn't breathing, why her heart isn't beating - for her, she's probably only just hit the water."

"Explain," Eärendil huffed, shaking his head. The Doctor sighed.

"You know how an embassy belongs to the country it represents, and not the country in which it stands?

"Aye," Eärendil nodded.

"Your wife does not belong to our timeline," the Doctor explained, gesticulating wildly, hoping it would help. "She is, in effect, frozen in time. How? Now, that I  _really_ can't explain."

"And how do you propose to...thaw her?" Eärendil shrugged. The Doctor clicked his fingers.

"Remove the jewel," he said. "If we remove the source of the temporal disturbance, then the radiation in her body should dissipate and return her to our time stream."

"Will this work? Eärendil asked. The Doctor swallowed hard.

"It will either work," he replied, "or it will kill her. But frankly, I don't think you have much of a choice." Eärendil nodded.

"I have mourned her for two years now," he replied. "If she dies here, at least I will have a body to bury."

"As you wish," the Doctor said. "You," he called to Galdor. "Open her hands." Galdor shook his head furiously.

"No, Doctor," the Elf replied. "I cannot." The Doctor stared at him, exasperated. "The Silmarils are cursed!" He cried out. "Anyone who touches one is doomed to suffer and die - Beren lost the hand which grasped it, Thingol was slain by Dwarves for their lust for it, the Lady…" he began, trailing off as Eärendil glowered at him. "I will not do it."

"Superstitious fool," Eärendil thundered, climbing the steps and kneeling once more by his wife's body. As he reached out his hands to take hers, they trembled and clenched. "It seems callous," he said softly, "that she should be returned to me, beyond all hope, only to kill her myself." Galdor bowed his head as Eärendil took his wife's hands gingerly, letting out a strange laugh as he clutched them. Gently he bent back her fingers, which moved without resistance, until the coruscating light of the Silmaril within was revealed.

" _Elbereth,_ " Galdor whispered, bringing praying hands to his forehead. Lights of gold and silver flooded out into the TARDIS interior, dancing across the curved surfaces like ripples on a lake. As his companions marvelled at the beauty of the jewel, the Doctor surreptitiously swivelled the screen towards him to take a reading of the energies it produced.

"Take it from her," he advised Eärendil lowly. The Lord of the Havens complied without a word, cradling the arms of Nauglamir in his hands and lifting it from Elwing's chest. The Silmaril hung between his hands like a star in the hands of a god as he rose and turned to present it to the Doctor.

"My, my," the Doctor muttered as he stooped to behold the Silmaril. "I can see why they're so popular." A eyeball-sized gem hung from a lattice of white gold and diamond, shining of its own internal and ever-shifting light like a supernova trapped in crystal, so beautiful it made the necklace it hung on look positively cheap. Reaching beneath the TARDIS console, he pulled out a heavy metal box. "Put it in here," he told Eärendil. "This is iron from the heart of a red giant - absolutely nothing's getting into it, or out of it." Eärendil's eyes flickered down to the Silmaril, and the Doctor felt the Man's heart begin to doubt. "I am not a thief," he said, proffering the box a little closer. With a great effort, Eärendil laid the necklace within the box.

"Now," the Doctor said as he snapped the lid shut and used the sonic to seal it, "we wait."

"How long will it take?" Eärendil asked, rushing back to his wife's side as though he had forgotten all about the Silmaril he had just so reluctantly relinquished.

"Hard to say," the Doctor replied. "The radiation must form a barrier pretty quickly, or she'd never have survived the fall into the water, but as to how long it takes to dissipate naturally? Like I said...we wait."

The three sat in silence for some time; the Doctor on the TARDIS console, Galdor on the rail on the gangway, and Eärendil on the floor by his wife's side. Every few minutes one would raise his head to speak, before the thick atmosphere of the TARDIS weighed too heavily on them and they kept their silence. The Lord of the Havens would turn to face the Doctor questioningly, to be met only with a shrug every time. After long minutes of silence, the Doctor finally spoke.

"It's been half an hour," he said quietly. "I'm sorry, but-"

"You said you didn't know!" Eärendil retorted. "You said you didn't know how long it would take for her to come back, what if-if we're just not waiting long enough? What if...it takes…"

"The time for any survivable amount of radiation to dissipate has long since passed," the Doctor interrupted, his voice a glum monotone. "She isn't coming back."

"She is one of the Eldar," Galdor spoke over him, a fire of rage beginning to build in him. "She is the granddaughter of a Maia, the blood of the gods flows in her veins! She cannot have surrendered her life so easily," he hissed, his bottom lip beginning to quiver. The Doctor's eyes swivelled downward as he shook his head in silence.

Eärendil's face slowly crumpled as the truth sank in. Letting out a choked sob, he wrapped his arms around Elwing's neck and pulled her limp body to his, weeping silently over her. Galdor took to his knees and began reciting a prayer as the Doctor hunched over the TARDIS console. For what seemed like an age, the Lord of the Haven's occasional cries to the heavens were the only thing that punctuated the pall that had fallen over the room.

"We will take her back to the Havens," Galdor whispered to his Lord, sitting next to him and wrapping an arm around him in an act of familiarity that would have been unthinkable to them both just hours ago. "She will be buried with honour and dignity, as befits a woman of her noble spirit." Eärendil nodded, eyes stinging with tears, as he grasped the Elf's hand. "Take us to the Havens," Galdor ordered the Doctor. "We have a funeral to arrange." The Doctor opened his mouth to reply, before thinking better of it and engaging the TARDIS' engines.

As the familiar old rumble and whine of the engines picked up, the Doctor stood hunched, deep in thought at the bizarre nature of the planet. The deeper he delved, the less sense any of it made - the laws of physics seemed to break down here; science seemed whimsical, almost capricious. Immortal humanoids, god-like beings who behaved like spoiled toddlers, jewels made of artificial starlight that glowed like-

The Doctor stood straight up, almost leaping into the air. "No," he hissed, cradling his head in his hands. "No, it can't be! Don't tell me!"

"What's going on?" Galdor asked as Eärendil stroked Elwing's cold hand.

"HOW did I miss it! How have I been so blind? Oh, you stupid old man, you!" He raged as he ran around the TARDIS console, spinning and babbling.

"Either tell us what's going on or show some respect!" Galdor barked, standing to his full height. For the first time since their first meeting, the Elf was every bit the imperial Captain of the Guard he seemed.

"I know what it is," the Doctor replied, leaping up the stairs to go nose-to-nose with Galdor. "The technology. The time field. The laws of physics going for a holiday - I know exactly what's causing it! And you're going to have the Devil's own time sorting it out without the help of a stone-cold, gold-plated genius," he added, gingerly stepping around Elwing's body as Eärendil looked up in confusion and outrage. "Which, lucky for you, I am." He cleared his throat as the Lord of the Havens took to his feet, a very real murderous glint in his eye. "Take her home," he said. "Mourn her, bury her, and prepare. Because after that, we're going to start asking questions," he said, a growl of excitement flickering at his voice as the TARDIS landed with a thump. The Doctor turned to the door and grasped the handles. "After that," he announced, throwing the doors wide open and letting the bright sun that filled the Haven's throne room fill the TARDIS, "we're going to Valinor!"

The Doctor stepped out and walked face-first into a wall of spear-points and arrow-heads. Grim-faced Elves and Men stared back at him from behind iron masks, surrounding the TARDIS on all sides.

"I think not, Doctor," Brego drawled from the throne behind his men-at-arms. "I think not."


	7. Chapter 7

“How did I guess,” the Doctor said, “that you’d take that throne before it even went cold?”

“I’m a man of action, Doctor,” Bregor replied, crossing his legs slowly as he stroked the the polished wood of the armrest. “You think I’d really allow this city to go without a leader after you kidnapped our Lord?” The wall of steel around the Doctor clanked and rattled as the soldiers tightened their grips on their bows and spears.

“Kidnapped?” The Doctor laughed. “Please. He came of his own free will. Don’t believe me? Ask him yourself,” he challenged him, stepping aside to clear the TARDIS’ doors. The soldiers gasped and straightened as one, and Bregor’s sour face stretched into a look of amazement as he rose from the throne. The Doctor turned to the TARDIS’ open door, and his hearts sank a little as he saw Eärendil step out into the throne room, carrying Elwing’s limp body in his arms as though she were only sleeping.

“My Lord,” Bregor began unctuously, stepping down slowly from the dais and winding his way towards Eärendil like a snake, “what wizardry is this?” Eärendil looked down at Elwing’s peaceful, pale face.

“We found her,” Eärendil muttered, stroking her cheek with his thumb. “She…” He lapsed into silence, staring through Bregor as though he were made of mist. Bregor bowed obsequiously and moved through the ranks of spearmen to clasp Eärendil’s arm.

“The Silmaril, my Lord,” he reminded him gently. “Where is the Silmaril the Lady carried?” Eärendil cocked his head back towards the TARDIS.

“Safe,” he replied at length. He pulled Elwing’s body tighter to his own and withdrew from the world again as Galdor made his way silently out of the TARDIS behind him.

“Captain Galdor,” Bregor addressed him, his slimy voice shot through with steel, “Are the Lord’s words accurate? Did you recover the Silmaril?”

“Lord Bregor, Sir,” Galdor replied bitterly, “I believe His Lordship wants to begin the rites for his wife before we get into-”

“YOU WILL ANSWER ME!” Bregor screeched, sending a shiver down the spine of all his soldiers, and causing the Doctor to bring a finger to his ear in pain. Galdor seethed.

“I answer to the Lord of the Havens of Sirion,” he replied, standing to attention.

“Well, what a shame for you,” Bregor whispered. “Because as his adjutant, and with over a dozen witnesses, I am declaring His Lordship currently unable to fulfill his duties. Which makes the Lord of the Havens of Sirion...me,” he finished, closing the gap between them and glaring up into the Elf’s impassive face, staring forward unblinking. As the silence between them continued, Bregor motioned for two soldiers to come forward from the ranks. “Take him to my offices,” he ordered them, not breaking his gaze. “The Captain and I have a very long conversation in our immediate future.” Galdor stared at Eärendil, pleading silently, but the Lord of the Havens was far away, in a world of strangeness and misery, as he very slowly rocked his wife’s body back and forth. It was as if the entire blazing row had simply washed over him.

“Captain, please,” a callow young Man muttered as he took him by the arm. Galdor shook him off with a grimace and fixed Bregor with a murderous stare before turning and allowing himself to be escorted out.

“My Lord, if we could get back to the matter at-”

“I am going,” Eärendil interrupted Bregor, “to my chapel. My wife must be dressed and prepared for burial.”

“I quite understand,” Bregor replied with a thin smile, “but, Sir, there are a few really rather urgent matters-”

“And we will discuss them,” Eärendil said, still looking at his wife, “afterwards. Send no-one to bother me,” he told Bregor as he hefted his wife’s body up higher and walked to the door behind the throne. “You’ll know when I’m ready.” Bregor gave a deep, knuckle-scraping bow as the Lord left the throne room, his furious face snapping upwards as he heard the door slam shut.

“You,” he growled at the Doctor, advancing like a predator, “have worked to undermine everything we hold dear!”

“Now, hold on,” the Doctor retorted, holding up a finger. “I offered my help. He took it. I don’t see what business that is of yours.”

“What business?” Bregor spat. “The Lord is my business. I am his right hand, his brother, father, and loyal son, and you steal him away like a Dark Elf and bring him back cradling the corpse of his wife? I see you, servant of Morgoth!”

“I’m no-one’s servant,” the Doctor replied, calm and low. “But I know your sort. You’re his right hand, alright; and in that hand, there’s a poisoned dagger, waiting for the right moment to strike.” A thin, gnarled hand slapped the Doctor in the face with a wicked swipe. A few of the soldiers let out audible gasps as the Doctor stumbled backwards.

“You will regret underestimating me, Doctor,” Bregor hissed, his eyes narrowed and body taut. “Tell me where the Silmaril is, or I swear on all the Valar that I will make you suffer.”

“If you want to make me suffer,” the Doctor replied, rubbing his jaw, “continue with the cliches. I don’t know what it is about that jewel, but if someone like you wants it that badly, there’s no way in hell I’m giving it to you.”

“As you wish,” Bregor replied slowly. “You! Take him to the dungeon,” he ordered a soldier. “Weigh him down with chains. Load him until he can barely breathe!” He shouted as the soldier led the Doctor away at spear-point.

“I don’t suppose,” the Doctor muttered to his captor as they marched out of the throne room together, “I can appeal to your good nature?” His response came with a swift kick to the kidneys. “Suit yourself.”

* * *

 

Galdor paced Bregor’s plush office in a fury. It had never really occurred to him before, but the obscene luxury of it all in the midst of their meagre, desperate dwellings made his blood boil; a finely-carved wooden desk stood imposing at the head of the room, with a comfortable leather chair looming over it like a bat ready to descent upon a mouse. Even the seat reserved for visitors was a velvet stool which wouldn’t have looked out of place as a consort’s throne, and on every wall shrouds and tapestries which would have done the finest weavers of Nogrod proud hung like banners of war. The glint of gold caught Galdor’s eye at every turn, catching the light of the oil lamps that hung from every wall, while from the office’s very window he could make out the ramshackle slums in which the majority of the remaining populace of Beleriand were forced to live. It made him sick.

The creak of the door made him turn and stand to attention out of habit. Bregor stood to his full, inconsequential height, evidently attempting to intimidate the Elf. “I hope you’re in more of a mood to be forthcoming, Captain,” he drawled, eyeballing his guest as he made his way to his desk, leaning against it as he motioned Galdor to sit. Galdor lowered himself into the stool slowly, holding Bregor’s gaze. Bregor let out a soft chuckle.

“We’re on the same side, Captain,” he said in his most conciliatory tone. “We both care for His Lordship, I see the same concern on your face that has followed me all these years. Do you not think I too grieved for the loss of the Lady Elwing, and felt the abduction of the young Princelings keenly?” Galdor’s lip curled as he remembered the sight of his own brother’s body, hewn down by the sons of Feanor, bleeding out across the children’s bedroom where they had been snatched.

“This...Doctor,” he continued, pacing slowly up and down the room. “He’s...charismatic, I’ll give him that. Powerful, I don’t dare to deny. But I have to say, you’ve become very loyal to him, very quickly.”

“I saw him appear out of thin air,” Galdor replied, “and name himself as an emissary from the Timeless Halls. Who am I to deny the will of Eru?” Bregor shrugged.

“And yet,” he retorted, “what has this Doctor done in his time here? Escaped from bondage-”

“A prison you put him in!” Galdor interjected. “And which you have returned him to!”

“Abducted Lord Eärendil from his very bed-”

“His Lordship came of his own volition, I was there and I swear to it!”

“-and the next we see of him, he is holding the body of his wife, dead these last two years and as fresh as the day she died! How do you explain this?” Galdor sighed loudly and shook his head.

“I cannot,” he replied. “Nor should I be able to. The ways of Eru are not for us to-”

“Open your eyes, man!” Bregor interrupted him. “Everything he has done has had but one end - to find and claim the Silmaril. He has it, does he not? In that...box of his.” Galdor’s eyes burned into Bregor’s. “I assume he said he would take it for ‘safe-keeping’? But isn’t it strange that he keeps it safe for us in a location only he can access?”

For the first time since their meeting, Galdor began to seriously doubt his companion. Bregor was not his friend; but he could find no way to deny his words.

“The Silmaril is our legacy,” he continued, drawing nearer to Galdor. “Our right. It was my kinsman Beren who prised it from Morgoth’s crown - and are we not all kinsmen here in the Havens? This Doctor...if he were truly a servant of Eru Iluvatar, why would he not seek to reunite the Silmaril with its rightful owners?”

Galdor broke his gaze from Bregor as ideas and revelations began to coalesce in his mind. He had been deceived. They had all been deceived.

“I will show you where the Silmaril is,” Galdor muttered. “But we must go now.”

“Lead the way, Captain,” Bregor replied effusively, gesturing to the door. The two made their way in silence back through the warren of candle-lit stone corridors to the throne room, where the TARDIS stood unguarded in the middle of the throne room. It was quite by luck, Galdor mused, that he had neglected to close the door as he’d left; the soft, golden light of the TARDIS’ inner sanctum spilled out through the crack in the door, cutting the moonlight that bathed the throne room in half.

“It’s inside,” Galdor said. “The box it’s in is heavy; we will need both of us to carry it.”

“Then by all means, go ahead,” Bregor said, inclining his head and rolling his eyes towards the door. He was far too subtle, Galdor realised, to walk into any ambush. The Elf nodded in return and pushed the door open, making his way inside, followed by Bregor. The Man gasped and stumbled as he beheld the splendour of the TARDIS interior.

“Our Lady,” he breathed, descending the steps to walk around the TARDIS console. “What...what magic is this?”

“It’s not magic,” Galdor replied from the top of the steps. “It’s technology.” Bregor fixed him with a look of confusion as he walked down the steps nonchalantly. “That’s what the Doctor kept saying. I’m not sure I ever fully understood him until now; I think what he meant was, nothing is as it seems. Everything, no matter how amazing, really has a simple truth behind it.”

Bregor nodded politely. “And what truth is that?”

Galdor smirked. “It’s a lie.” The TARDIS lurched and send Bregor sprawling as Galdor threw the lever that he’d watch the Doctor use time and again to send the TARDIS on its way, gripping onto the console before he too was sent tumbling.

“Traitor!” Bregor screamed as he righted himself. “What have you done?”

“Traitor?” Galdor replied. “Traitor? There’s only one traitor here, Bregor! How long have you been under the Dark Lord’s sway?” He threw himself across the floor, grabbing Bregor by the collar and forcing him over the rail.

“Captain Galdor, unhand me at once!” Bregor screeched.

“I saw the look in your eye when you spoke of the Silmaril. The lust. The madness. It was the same look I saw in the eyes of Maedhros and Maglor the day they came for Eärendil’s sons!” Bregor’s eyes widened into a mad glare as Galdor practically frothed in rage. “And to suggest that Eru himself would deign to give us the Silmaril and prolong this war? Only a servant of Morgoth would think such blasphemy!”

Bregor’s face twisted into a mask of fury. “My master will raze your precious Havens to the ground!” He spat, kneeing Galdor in the groin and forcing him to let go. “Your race is weak and ready to fall - all it takes is one little fracture and you watch the whole rotten thing come tumbling down!” Another lurch from the TARDIS put him off-balance and allowed Galdor to tackle him to the ground, groping to wrap his fingers around Bregor’s throat.

“Bastard!” He growled. “You’ve doomed us all! And for what? Morgoth will destroy you the second you’ve outlived your usefulness! Coward!”

“This war is lost!” Bregor choked as Galdor wrapped his hands around his neck. “I’ve picked the winning side!” A sharp, slender fist went crashing into Galdor’s temple, breaking his hold and allowing Bregor to roll him over and begin pummelling him. “Your kind should never have left Valinor.”

Summoning the agility of the Elves, Galdor twisted beneath the weight of Bregor’s body and slipped out from his grasp, grabbing the back of his shirt and running him, screaming in fury, to the door, where he threw him face-first into the wood. As Bregor slipped down into a heap, bleeding from his head, he began laughing shakily.

“This changes nothing. You cannot win this war...nothing can.” Galdor advanced on Bregor as the TARDIS came to a halt with a bump, wrapping his hand around his throat and lifting him up.

“He can,” he hissed, opening the door and throwing him out. Bregor’s scream was cut short as he went face-first into a wall of water, twisting and spasming as the water pressure crushed the life out of him. Reaching a desperate hand out to Galdor as the force snapped his fingers back like twigs, he let out a last, bubbling cry as the Elf closed the door, leaving him alone on the seabed.


	8. Chapter 8

Maybe it was just the chains, but the cell seemed somewhat smaller and more cramped than the Doctor remembered it being. Bregor’s men had taken his instruction to heart, leaving the Doctor kneeling in the middle of the cold stone floor with his arms manacled to short chains embedded in the stone, his ankles held in iron cuffs and a heavy collar around his neck, chained to the wall.

“I think you ought to know,” he shouted into the silence, “you’re very close to getting on my bad side!” As his voice echoed, he shifted uncomfortably in his heavy chains. “Joke’s on you,” he continued, struggling. “This is, what - wrought iron? Probably won’t take me more than 200 years to chew through it!” The veins at his temples bulged as he straightened his back and strained against his bonds, desperately trying to pull the chains loose from the stone. “Just a matter of regenerating enough teeth to get the job done,” he groaned, jaw clenched. “Which is no problem, let me tell you - I’ve had more teeth than you’ve had hot dinners.” He collapsed back into a ball, puffing and panting with effort. “Or I could just regenerate into Arnold Schwarzenegger,” he muttered, dust from the floor sticking to his clammy brow. “That’d show you.”

As he lay face-down on the cold ground, the Doctor once more went through the puzzle pieces whirling in his mind, only so recently having begun to make sense. Half-remembered fragments, near-myth, became solid, propped up by the things he’d seen and heard in this bizarre world.

“Why would you do this?” He asked quietly, to no-one. “What did you get out of it? I just don’t understand.” His exhausted pants filled the small space as he worked up the wherewithal to sit straight again. “Why would anyone sit back and watch a species drive itself to its own annihilation?” The silence was deafening. “You always were trouble,” he growled. “I promise you, the moment I get my TARDIS back I’m filing one hell of a complaint!”

A cold breeze ruffled the Doctor’s hair and stirred up the dirt and dust from the floor. That old, familiar groan filled the air, and the Doctor turned to his side in amazement as the TARDIS began to materialise in front of him. “Oh!” He cried out, attempting to jump for joy before remembering the several chains binding him. “You beauty! I didn’t know you could do that! Fender Stratocaster! Solid gold sonic screwdriver! River Song in nothing but a smile!” The noise and gusts subsided as the TARDIS materialised fully, leaving the cell in silence once more. “Worth a try,” the Doctor muttered.

The TARDIS door flew open, almost blinding the Doctor with light as he made out a tall and noble silhouette in the doorway. “What?” He breathed. “Things must be worse than I thought. Which one are you?” He called out. “Unless I haven’t been you yet - you know I don’t like to skip ahead.”

The figure in the doorway extended an arm and the whirr and green light of a sonic screwdriver filled the cell. All at once, the chains keeping the Doctor bound shattered, crumbling into dust around him. As the Doctor got up, dusting himself off, his rescuer moved forward to help him to his feet.

“Galdor,” the Doctor gasped. “How did you…?”

The Elf gave the easy smile of a man catching up with an old friend. “It’s a long story,” he replied. “How long have you been here?” The Doctor shrugged.

“About an hour.”

“Good,” Galdor replied. “Well...not for you. But it means we still have time.”

“Time for what?” The Doctor called after him as Galdor soniced the cell door open and strode purposefully out.

“Time to find His Lordship and get him to Valinor,” Galdor said. “Come on!”

“No, no, no, no, no, no - hang on!” The Doctor said, digging his heels in. “I’m the Doctor, I’m the one who goes charging off into all kinds of ridiculousness, I’m the one with the sonic - can I have that back, actually?” Galdor frowned and tossed the sonic screwdriver back to the Doctor.

“You’re a terrible companion, you know that?” Galdor sighed as he turned to leave the dungeons with the Doctor steaming ahead of him.

“Where’d you learn that word?” The Doctor asked as they climbed a winding set of stone steps.

“Companion?” Galdor replied. “Isn’t that what you call them? All those people you travel with?” The Doctor stopped and fixed Galdor with a serious look. The Elf relented. “I had...some time to kill in the TARDIS.”

“I’d like to know what you were doing in it in the first place,” the Doctor demanded, his voice no longer playful.

“I’ll explain on the way,” Galdor relented as the two made their way, rather more slowly, to the top of the stairs.

* * *

 

“If you knew anything about me or my ways, you’d not have murdered a man in cold blood and used my TARDIS to do it,” the Doctor said darkly as they emerged into a wide corridor.

“Bregor was too dangerous to live,” Galdor replied. “As a servant of Morgoth he could have summoned an army big enough to wipe us out ten times over at any time. And anyway, that was...before. I’m different now.”

The Doctor turned on his heels to regard Galdor as they walked down the corridor towards the throne room. “So I can see,” he retorted, gesturing to Galdor’s outfit; a gold and emerald nehru jacket with soft felt trousers beneath, and a pair of fur boots, all of which the Doctor recognised as coming from his wardrobe. “Made yourself at home, did you?”

“The armour got a bit uncomfortable,” Galdor muttered in response. “And it felt like...like the TARDIS needed a Doctor. Maybe not THE Doctor, but-”

“No,” The Doctor replied, stopping dead, his bushy eyebrows furrowed in fury. “Not ‘the’ Doctor. Get that through your skull. There’s me, and there’s only me. And when jackanapes like you get it into your head that all you need is a TARDIS and a sonic screwdriver and a stupid outfit, that’s when accidents start happening! That’s how people get killed! It’s a miracle you didn’t crash the thing into the sun trying to get it to me!”

Galdor’s eyes were not hard in rage, but soft in sorrow. “I learned how angry you can be,” he replied. “I just never thought you’d show it to your friends.”

The Doctor sighed heavily and turned his back on Galdor. “Lets find your man,” he muttered. “And you’ve got a lot more to learn about me, it would appear.” The two made the rest of the long walk to Eärendil’s private chapel in moody silence.

“You stay out here,” the Doctor whispered to Galdor, “look out for guards. I’ll go and talk to him.”

“I should talk to him,” Galdor rebutted. “He’s my Lord and I know him better than you.”

“I know what he’s going through!” the Doctor hissed. “This is not the time to argue, either stand guard or get out of my way!” Galdor seethed and stepped aside as the Doctor straightened his collar and entered.

The chapel was a bare, spartan room dominated by a large altar in front of a painting of a woman in religious garb which took up the entire wall. Upon the altar, Elwing lay in the same white dress she was found in but covered in a gossamer-thin veil. Moonlight streamed in from a cupola in the ceiling, high above the Doctor’s head. Eärendil knelt in prayer before his wife’s body, his dirty blonde hair cascading over the white veil, leaving streaks of dust and grime.

“I told Bregor,” Eärendil barked without turning, “not to send any of his men.”

“I’m not his man,” the Doctor replied, hands in his pockets. Eärendil turned slowly, fixing the Doctor with a hateful gaze.

“Begone,” he said. “You've done enough damage in my kingdom.”

“Funny way of saying ‘thank you’,” the Doctor quipped.

“Thank you?” Eärendil spat. “What have I to thank you for?”

“Got your Silmaril back, for a start,” the Doctor said.

“Which must be kept secret above all,” Eärendil shot back, “lest it draw all seven sons of Fëanor from the grave to claim it!”

“Got your wife back,” the Doctor continued.

“Dead,” Eärendil choked. “After making promise after promise that you could save her.”

“I made no such thing,” the Doctor hissed, taking a few steps forward to stand directly behind Eärendil. “I offered my help - that's all I ever promise, that I'll try.”

“So why are you here, then?” Eärendil talked over him. “What's left that you haven't sullied or spoiled or failed at entirely?” He spat, almost shaking with rage as he clasped his praying hands together so tightly the Doctor thought he heard the bones crack.

“I came to you with an offer,” the Doctor said calmly. “I haven't retracted it. I never will. I can take you to your Valinor - it's your only chance to end this war.”

Eärendil laughed mirthlessly. “What do I care?” He shot back. “The survivors of Beleriand number in the tens of thousands. Entire houses of Eldar and Edain are ended. Who am I ending this war for? The sickly rabble out there who'll be dead in a few years anyway? The Elves, who'll just scurry back to Valinor? There's no point in fighting anymore.”

“Your sons,” the Doctor said, “still live. You saw them with your own eyes - safe and well looked-after. If you ever want to see them again, your only chance is to end this war before their captors get wiped out or they decide your boys have outlived their usefulness!”

“Only, that’s not true, is it?” Eärendil said, a sudden epiphany dawning.

“How so?” The Doctor asked.

“The one thing they want,” Eärendil replied, “we now have.” He turned to face the Doctor, his eyes seeming to look straight through him. The Doctor’s back stiffened as he understood Eärendil’s meaning.

“No,” he replied. “I won’t allow it.”

“Who the hell do you think you are to ALLOW me my wish?” Eärendil shot back, his voice at first quiet and ending up a roar as he rose to his feet to stand so close to the Doctor their noses touched. “What makes you think you have any authority over me, or my possessions? My lands are raped, my armies are on the verge of defeat - all I have left to call my own are my boys, and if giving Maedhros and Maglor the Silmaril will get them back, then they are welcome to it.”

“Your wife went to her death to make sure that never happened!” The Doctor growled, pointing to Elwing’s body on the altar behind them. “You sit here with your self-pity and your misery, keeping vigil over her corpse as you plot to desecrate everything she gave up her life for!” Eärendil deflated, his anger frittering away with exhaustion. “There is another way. A better way. Come with me, and we can end this war today.”

“Can you bring her back?” He mumbled, gazing lovingly at Elwing. The Doctor sighed and cast his gaze downward. “This war is already lost.”

“I’m sorry,” the Doctor said. “I can’t.”

“Then change your name, old man,” Eärendil replied sharply as he resumed kneeling at Elwing’s side. “You’re no doctor.”

The Doctor’s chest swelled with wounded pride until he cried out: “Okay! Okay, what the hell! One last try for good luck!” His voice rang out like a fanfare in the cramped chapel, Eärendil backing away and looking for a weapon, fearing the Doctor had gone mad. “Right then, what do we know?” He mused aloud as he paced around the altar, staring down at Elwing like she was a puzzle to be solved. “She was suspended from our time stream by the temporal energy emanating from the Jewel she held. Quantum Chronology 101 says that once any outside temporal influence is removed any object affected by it should slowly - but eventually - return to its own time stream.”

“That's not the problem, she's dead!” Eärendil said, exasperated.

“But is she?” The Doctor retorted, a look of mad glee on his face. “See, I didn't understand it either - the radiation in and of itself didn't seem harmful, and she didn't die by drowning - she was barely damp when we got her in the TARDIS. We have a woman who should, by all accounts, be alive...but isn't.”

“What about if we take her back to the TARDIS,” Eärendil suggested. “Would that help?” The Doctor shook his head.

“No, I...oh! OH! OH!” He exclaimed, running around the altar in furious wonder. “Oh, of course! It's so obvious! Yes! Yes, we have no bananas! She is not dead!”

“Doctor,” Eärendil stammered, clutching his chest, “if you're just messing me around…”

“I'm not,” the Doctor said softly, clutching Eärendil by the shoulders. “I can bring her back. You see,” he began, wheeling away again, “I've made a schoolboy error. Yes, removing the source of temporal disturbance should reinsert the subject into the timestream - but we removed it in the TARDIS!” He finished with a joyous grin, to a non-reaction from Eärendil. “The TARDIS is kind of...exempt from regular time and space. We didn't reinsert her into her timeline - we left her in the kind of limbo the TARDIS operates in! And when we took her out, her body accepted that as its regular time stream!” Eärendil held up his hand to stop the Doctor talking before his head exploded.

“How do we fix it?” He asked. The Doctor waggled his eyebrows as he shook his hands dramatically.

“A little kick-start.” Eärendil’s eyes widened as the Doctor’s hands began to glow, bathing the whole room in an eerie golden light, as though sunrise had come hours early. “See, her mind is like a computer program that's had two separate and conflicting instructions - the software has shut down, but the hardware is still functioning.” Eärendil gave the Doctor another blank look. “Trust me,” the Doctor muttered, “that's a really good analogy.” He knelt beside Elwing, shaking his left hand and wiggling his index finger until the tip glowed white-hot. “Funny,” the Doctor remarked, wagging his glowing finger at Eärendil. “I saw a film like this once.”

“Just do something!” Eärendil exploded. The Doctor turned back to Elwing and took a deep breath before jabbing her in the forehead, letting out a cry of pain and flying back across the room. As he hit the wall Elwing’s body bucked and arched as she took a huge inward breath, limbs flailing. Eärendil fell to his knees, crawling over to his wife.

“Elwing!” Eärendil cried as his wife returned to life, sobbing and screaming, in his arms. “Oh, Lady Elbereth, oh, my love...oh, my love…”

“Where,” Elwing managed to groan between screams, “where?”

“You're at home, darling!” Eärendil replied, smiling widely with tears streaming down his cheeks. “You're safe, love, I promise.”

“I...I fell...water…” She croaked before collapsing into a coughing fit.

“Yes,” Eärendil replied, sniffing messily. “Yes, you did. But you're back. You're safe,” he whispered before collapsing into tears, cradling Elwing close to him.

“Oh, Daleks!” The Doctor cried out in pain as he stirred. “That’s never nice.”

Galdor burst into the room, causing all eyes to swivel to him. “Lady Elwing!” He cried out in joy. “We thought you were lost.” Elwing’s mouth opened and closed silently as she struggled to put words together. “Talkative as ever,” he muttered before turning to the Doctor. “We've got problems.”

“How many?”

“About sixty heavily-armed ones.”

“Can you walk?” Eärendil asked Elwing, who responded by passing out.

“Carry her,” the Doctor ordered Eärendil, who swung Elwing over his back.

“What do we do?” Eärendil asked.

“Run,” the Doctor and Galdor said as one.

The endless stone corridors of the citadel passed by in a blur as they ran as fast as they could through the labyrinth, the rattle and clank of armoured soldiers never far behind. As they reached the throne room, halfway to the TARDIS, Galdor called a halt.

“It's no use,” he said. “They'll catch us up before we get there.”

“He's right,” Eärendil said sitting on his throne to catch his breath with the unconscious Elwing in his lap. “I can't run any faster than this carrying her.”

“What do you suggest we do, then?” The Doctor replied, exasperated. “It doesn't look like we have much of a choice, does it?” Galdor fixed him with a meaningful look. “Oh, no you don't,” the Doctor replied. “I've had enough meaningless sacrifice in my life, I won't have any more!”

“No victory is meaningless,” Galdor replied with a strange smile. The Doctor shook his head.

“I'll not buy an escape with death.”

“I do not intend to kill anyone,” Galdor replied. “These are my men - that Bregor brainwashed them is not their fault. But even unarmed, I can still hold them off as long as you need.”

“You've changed,” the Doctor muttered. Galdor nodded.

“Lady Elwing,” he asked. “How'd you do it? Regeneration energy?”

“Just a smidge,” the Doctor replied. “Just enough to reset her brain, remind it where it belongs. That'll cost me an earlobe somewhere down the line,” he groaned before double-taking. “How...how did you…”

Galdor laughed good-naturedly. For the first time, the Doctor swore he could see the light of Valinor emanating from his friend. “I took Bregor on a one-way trip, but I realised I had a duty to get your TARDIS back to you; which meant I had to learn how to fly it. That took...a while.” The Doctor’s face was set in stone.

“How long?” Galdor’s smile faded to something sadder.

“Two hundred years,” he replied softly. The Doctor stepped back in shock. “One of the benefits of being immortal.”

The Doctor babbled incoherently. “I'd say you haven't aged a day, but…” The two immortals laughed together.

“I've seen things, Doctor,” he said wistfully. “Your adventures. The...vastness of the universe. I...I wish I could have seen it.” The Doctor extended a hand and Galdor gripped it tightly.

“You will,” he replied. “On my life.” The Elf nodded and reached into his jacket pocket, pulling out a thin silver wand with a bright golden light at its head. “Oh, you didn't,” the Doctor scoffed. Galdor chuckled.

“Never did try to use it,” he said. “Let's see how much hell I can raise with it.”

“Well said,” the Doctor replied as Eärendil rose from his throne at the sound of shouting, running armoured soldiers echoing down the corridor behind them. “Good luck.”

“And to you, Doctor,” Galdor replied, inclining his head to Eärendil before striding out into the corridor, shutting the door behind him and locking it with an electronic whistle.


End file.
